Festival In Alburtis Pursues Town's Past

July 14, 1986|by SCOTT J. HIGHAM, The Morning Call

Stone and brick walls still stand as sentinels amid the wildflowers and carefully tended lawns in Alburtis, where the Lock Ridge Iron Co. pumped out pig iron for nearly 66 years. During the late 1880s, 47 iron companies in the Lehigh Valley produced more anthracite iron than any other part of Pennsylvania.

Though the company and its industry have long disappeared, hundreds of visitors return each year to Alburtis to attend the "Furnace Festival," a daylong celebration held on the grounds of the Lock Ridge factory. Yesterday was no different.

"This year's theme is 'Echoes of the Past' so the kids can see the customs and traditions of the past," said Jean Stoneback, an organizer of yesterday's festival held at what is now called the Lehigh County Lock Ridge Park. "Years ago, nobody cared about the history of this area. We're trying to bring it back."

Stoneback's family, the Butzes, bought the foundry in 1920 and sold much of it for scrap during the next 50 years. The foundry's smoke stacks were demolished. The factory's engines were sold. And with each sale, a part of Alburtis's history was lost, she said.

"Now everyone is trying to restore it," Stoneback said, standing outside the main furnace building, the only remaining structure left intact. A modern- day Stonehenge consisting of concrete pillars, brick arch ways and parts of stone walls dots the landscape.

But yesterday - between the pillars and walls - German folk music, steam engines, Irish fiddlers, a 1921 Model T Ford and peddlers of funnel cakes and pierogies filled the landscape.

In one part of the 80-year-old park, a row of antique gas engines brought by the Hay Creek Historical Society of Morgantown popped and sputtered. Nearby, John Fleming flanked his 1921 Ford Model T market wagon. In the bed of the wagon, Fleming fired up a 1917 Maytag washing machine. A two-cycle, half- horsepower gas engine below the machine's wooden washing barrel turned an array of rods and wheels, which would spin laundry inside the contraption.

On the other side of the park, which is supported by Lehigh County, the Hosfeld German Band played traditional folk music to rows people in lawn chairs. Nearby, a vendor sold homemade vanilla ice cream as others stood behind tables that were lined with crafts.

Inside the furnace building, organizers presented several acts, ranging from Paul Wieand's folkdancing and singing group and the Harem Jewels to puppeteer Tom Lohrman and John Tomesek, an 11-year-old magician. After Tomesek's act, his pigeon refused to submit to its carrying case, flying instead into the rafters of the building.

"It can't decide what to do with all this noise," Stoneback said.

Elsewhere on the grounds of the 57-acre park, the Men of Linen demonstrated the art of flax spinning and weaving, Jo Koltai sharpened tools and scissors on an antique whetstone, Tom Hoffner gave hayrides and Ray Rogers presented his miniature circus.

"The people are so wonderful," said Stoneback as she looked upon the celebration. "It's one big family.

Stoneback, who lives at the Lock Ridge foreman's house, said the event was also organized by Pat Plouffe of the Lock Ridge Historical Society. The event was sponsored the Lehigh County Historical Society, the Lehigh County Arts Grant Program and the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania Council on the Arts.